Monday, July 23, 2012

Fill 'Er Up!

I recently remembered that I had some Micromaster bases. I let my son play with them a couple of years ago and forgot about them. I went digging into my son's toy box and found Hot House, Air Wave and Greasepit. Well, I found the bases. I've never actually owned the complete sets, the most complete one being Greasepit who was missing the gas pump, missile and launcher and signs. At least I had the figure.

I decided that it would be nice to complete these. So I went to the store to pick up new ones. Then I remembered that I couldn't just go to the store for these guys. That meant eBay, always eBay. I found the missile, the missile launcher and the gas pump being sold by the same seller for $5 each! I contacted him to ask if he'd combine shipping if I bought all three because he wanted $3 shipping per item. I've yet to hear from him, even though I asked the question two weeks ago. That sucked.

Not wanting this to be some long drawn out process, I continued my search. Kinda. I got sidetracked by my purchase of Sureshot and I like to purchase one figure at a time. I had a saved search for anything with the word "Micromaster" in the title. Lo and behold, a complete Greasepit with box! I've noticed that the loose, complete ones have been going for about $40 or more. This one had an asking price of $25. Hot damn. Hot damn. It should go without saying that I hit the "Buy It Now" button fairly quickly.

Greasepit is a redeco of Mudslinger, of the Autobot Off Road Patrol. Mudslinger was one of my favorite Micromasters and the leader of his patrol. Like Mudslinger, Greasepit's oversized wheels fascinate me. It's the way that they designed his tires. Only half the tire rotates, which is weird, but I find awesome. It's like he has bagels for tires. Radical.

According to his Tfwiki entry, Greasepit essentially tricks Autobots into refueling at their gas station and them giving them crappy fuel. I could be wrong, but I could have sworn that the toys had always stated that all Transformers used Energon. Well, until Nucleon. I know that was the case with the cartoon. The only times the Autobots ever used gasoline was in the Marvel Comics, thanks to G.B.Blackrock. So was this an attempt to combine fictions? Doubtful, since I don't think Hasbro or any toy company really cared about that kind of thing, they just wanted to sell toys. This whole deal with continuities and such seems to be a new phenomenon.

So I bought this Friday and I got it in the mail today. I think that's the fastest I've ever received a package.

Here's the box, it's seen better days. I had completely forgotten about how the Micromasters had comic book inspired art on the back. Can't say I'm a fan.

I love the later font

Like I said, it's seen better days

I really dig the tech specs with the bars

Only $8.97 at Kmart now!

Once I opened the box, I noticed a few things. The first being that this thing was really dusty. The second was that the paint had almost completely been rubbed off of Greasepit's face. My Greasepit and base were in a lot better shape.

Dusty. Robot without a face

Side by side with the one I already had. The new one is on the left.

Side by side, The new purchase is on the left.

So what I've decided to do is take the pieces I was missing from the new one and add them to my old one. Considering that I was going to spend $15 plus most likely $9 is shipping and still not have the signs, spending $24 to get everything plus the box feels like I came out with a win. I think I may keep one in battle station mode and the other in gas station mode that way everything gets used.